“You should have to win something,” said Mountain West commissioner Craig Thompson. “You should be a champion to get into this type of system.”

“When you get to [limiting it to] conference champions, you’re not necessarily dealing with the best teams,” said SEC commissioner Mike Slive. “You’re creating more of a tournament than playing for the national championship.”

The bottom line is the bottom line here. Is it good for college football to limit the SEC to one entrant to the title game? Thompson prefers to spread the wealth, baby. My bet is that Slive is going to find himself significantly outnumbered on this.

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16 responses to “The plus-one debate, in two quotes”

I see, so now the playoff guys are backing of the let’s settle it on the field talk and about fairness. It was an unfair system when “Up-&-Coming U.” couldn’t get in because they didn’t have the credentials to get in, but now they want to exclude teams that do have the credentials to get in.

LSU, Oregon (rematch), Oklahoma State and Wisconsin. 5 losses, 2 to teams with losing records. By the way, Penn State was 20 yards away from reaching the B1G Championship game last year over Wisconsin. I’ll take LSU-Alabama over that compilation of defensive ineptitude any day of the week.

Earth to Craig Thompson – you’re not getting into either set-up. Thanks for playing.

The only thing I disagree with in regards to the Oklahoma State loss is that, while it was a terrible loss to a terrible team, people fail to mention the circumstances. Didn’t that loss happen less than 24 hours after two basketball coaches died in a plane crash? There’s absolutely NO WAY that the coaches were fully there for that game, which would absolutely filter down to the players. It’s pretty hard to be super motivated when your best leaders (i.e. coaches) are down in the dumps. Maybe it’s just my opinion, but losing under those circumstances isn’t considerably worse than losing at home and failing to make it past the 25 yard line the entire game which is what Bama did. Call me crazy but I still would have rather seen Oklahoma State get their shot.

Absolutely concur. Bama did not win their division. Pretty simple. And for all those who complain “but they missed all those field goals”…none was closer in than 44 yards. Most field goal kickers miss from that range out.

I’ve never understood this excuse. Am I to really believe that the death of two women’s basketball coaches affected them so greatly they couldn’t beat a crappy team? It’s not like they were members of the football staff. I’m sure they were saddened, but not THAT saddened. Also, losing a game you should have won, at home by 3 against the other great team in the country is not worse than losing to Iowa State, even if you are completely right about the coaches’ deaths being such a significant factor.

Continuing on; Bama, LSU and Ark end up with one loss. We win the SEC with our record from last year. How many teams in other conferences can beat our one-loss teams? Maybe two have a chance. How many teams would have to be in a playoff to have at least two SEC teams represented? At least 8 by Thompson’s configuring. If three of the top 8 teams were from the SEC, how many would Thompson, Scott, Delaney figure should be represented? One. And it will be known as the National Football Tournament.

They can shove that configuring where the sun don’t shine.

Those guys are lining up an opinion poll using twisted thinking to describe what they see as the best candidates. Kinda reminds you of a certain party’s thinking for the Presidential Election.

The pile stinks worse every day. There is no solution to the playoff conversation that will suit anyone, let alone everyone. College football is changed forever and not for better. BTW, doesn’t eliminating divisions solve the “didn’t win division” argument?

The ACC had two divisions: Bad and Horrible. The Pac-12 South, with an ineligible SoCal, was Football Like, but it wasn’t actually football. If Penn State holds off firing Paterno for another week, PSU beats Nebraska and wins their division over Wisconsin.

Face it, winning a CFB administrative district does not magically confer some sort of validity to a team. The criteria “win your division” has no merit other than “it would have prevented Alabama from playing last year,” which means it’s a rule for next year to fix a problem from last year. Not smart.

A 4 team format should be the 4 best teams. A Plus-One should take the two highest ranked post-bowl teams. A conference champion mandate simply rewards programs in crappy conferences.

Finally, Oklahoma State would not have needed a conference championship mandate to be in a 4 team tournament last year, so I don’t get how the rule last season would have “fixed” anything. It simply would have excluded Alabama in favor of Wisconsin – a team that ended the season with 3 losses, one to a team with a losing record.

How does that make any sense at all?

Bloviation for the Dawgnation

Quote Of The Day

“It brings back a great Bulldog running back in Thomas who has NFL playing experience and has had success as a college coach at multiple schools. He also inherits a position that has been built to an elite level by Bryan. And it gives Bryan the opportunity to return to coaching the position he played and the one where he cut his teeth serving as a graduate assistant under wide receiver coach John Eason here at UGA. It also provides him with a new experience as a passing game coordinator.” -- Mark Richt, AB-H, 2/16/15